The Governing Dynamics of Human Team Activity

James Bushik

TITLE: The Governing Dynamics of Human Team Activity

Humans and their societies live according to the simple and predictable laws of nature. As our ability to identify and rationalize these laws continues to grow, so too does our ability to sway the courses of our own lives. This thesis explores, through the lens of basic human need, the thirteen forces that govern the actions of human beings – both as individual agents and as agents of groups. Conventional wisdom holds that culture, politics and economics are the three basic vital signs used to gauge societies’ overall health and wellbeing. This view is the foundation for a vast portion of modern strategic thinking and is the product of many centuries of debate. However, this theory is ultimately incomplete because more primal factors are at work. Culture, politics, and economics are merely emergent results of continued human interaction, not the underlying forces that allow humans to interact in the first place. Rather, humanity as a complex system is governed by at least thirteen independent and mathematically measureable forces, which when appropriately and adequately fulfilled allow the phenomena of culture, politics, and economics to emerge.

Identified via psychological and group dynamic empirical observation, the following are the collective basic needs for humans acting as individual agents and agents of groups.

Communication – the act of imparting or interchanging thoughts, opinions, or information
Curiosity – discovery, investigation, exploration, learning
Decision Making – the act of selecting a course of action among several alternatives
Leadership – acceptance of responsibility for the group itself; especially its safety, morality, and leadership development
Love / Belonging – friendship, family, sexual intimacy (and possibly empathy)
Physiological – breathing, food, water, sex, sleep, homeostasis, excretion
Planning – the act of thinking, creating and maintaining plans, the foundation for intelligent behavior
Problem Solving – the act of moving from a given state to a desired goal state
Safety – security of body, of employment, of resources, of morality, of the family, of health, of property
Self-actualization – morality, creativity, spontaneity, problem solving, lack of prejudice, acceptance of facts
Self-esteem – morale, confidence, achievement, respect of others, respect by others
Teamwork – collaboration, contribution, effectiveness and efficiency beyond individual accomplishment
Trust – reliance, fulfillment of promise

The implications of this view of humanity are potentially profound, transcending all areas of human activity and potential – including the study of human swarms.

Back to Swarmfest2010_program